On studying the career of Nathan Hale, who, with Major André, owes his historicity to the American War of Independence, one is conscious of being in touch with a character at once dangerous and difficult, to quote the words in which an eminent English statesman has described the mystic who is at the same time a practical man. In Hale, as his private correspondence clearly shows, there was every indication that an otherwise reasonable and lovable disposition was supplemented by a deep-running current of that hard fanaticism which has ever marked your descendant of the Pilgrim Fathers. Like his fellow-spy André, Hale was a man whose social and intellectual gifts were of an important order, while the admitted excellence of the man's private character, as well as his high sense of personal honour, go a long way to justify the opinion generally held by Americans regarding the motives which induced Hale to enter into the business of spying—according to that view, a pure love of the principle of liberty, which prompted him to risk his life in the service of his country. "Spies," says Vattel, "are usually condemned to capital punishment and not unjustly, there being hardly any other way of preventing the mischief which they do. For this reason a man of honour who would not expose himself to die by the hand of a common executioner, ever declines serving as a spy. He considers such work disgraceful, as it can seldom be done without some kind of treachery." Hale himself gave recorded expression, however, to his view of the matter when he said that, "every kind of service necessary for the public good becomes honourable by being necessary"—a view which is quite in keeping with that mysticism which ever characterises the fanatic who claims the support of spiritual principles for his acts. Again, Hale declared: "I wish to be useful. If the exigencies of my country demand a peculiar service, its claims to the performance of that service are imperious." André, on the other hand, stated that in the ill-starred enterprise into which he threw himself, he was mainly "actuated by a thirst for military glory, the applause of his countrymen and perhaps a brigadiership"—clearly a true megalomaniac. Indeed, André's last words gave the key to the large personal vanity which underlay his undoubtedly interesting character: "I call upon you all, gentlemen, to bear witness that I die like a brave man." Hale indicated a purely ethical or religious attachment to the ideas inherent in Independence doctrines of liberty, when he made his last utterance: "I only regret that I have but one life to sacrifice for my country"—the true spirit of the Coliseum martyr. The young American was willing to give up life itself for his idea of liberty.